Le Divorce

Description

Set in Paris, LE DIVORCE is an alluring and elegant comedy of love and divorce French-style. Isabel Walker, a young, not-so-innocent, American abroad, arrives in Paris to find that her sister's French husband ('the frog prince') has just walked out. While Isabel embarks on her own sentimental education - seduced by gourmet food, antiques, existentialism and an older man - her sister's marriage disintergrates into bitter Franco-American wrangles over money, titles and a mysterious painting. With a sharp tongue and an ironic eye for the foibles of the Parisian bourgeoisie, the French art world and American ex-patriots, Isabel is a collector of experience, even those she can't control. Comedy veers suddenly close to tragedy as passionate jealousy, self-interest and artistic intrigue interweave.

Diane Johnson was born in Illinois and educated at the universities of Utah and California. She is the author of several acclaimed novels, including Le Marriage, Persian Nights and The Shadow Knows, two collections of essays, and biographies of Mary Ellen Peacock and Dashiell Hammett. She has also written screenplays and collaborated with Stanley Kubrick on The Shining. She lives in Paris and San Francisco with her husband.